her life in prose

We like to imagine God’s Will for our life as some beautifully detailed book, written full of pleasures and joys and trials, and ending with the name of our spouse spelled out in gold filigree under the chapter entitled, “Happily Ever After.”  The concept of a divine, yet ambiguous Will that we are expected to discover by some means- and no one really knows what these means are - is a popular idea in Christian culture. However, I have come to a place in my life where this overly specific plan has turned from a supposed ethereal comfort into a hellish anxiety.  If God has all of these things planned out for me, how am I supposed to disover them?  What if I choose the wrong college?  The wrong spouse?  The wrong career?  As these decisions come closer to impacting my current reality, I have become increasingly worried about them. Through this season, I have tried every day to put these worries into God’s hands; to trust Him with the det...

I am not sure why I'm writing this. Or maybe, I know why I'm writing this, but I am unaware of what I expect to accomplish or gain in writing this. There really is nothing to be gained. What do I know about life? It would seem that I know nothing. That exactly when I am able to regain footing on this path that something else knocks me to my knees. Not that this is even about me, in the grand scheme of things, it's really not. My childhood friend, Ruth George, was murdered yesterday. Strangled. Left dead in the back of her car. Yesterday I did not know this and life continued as it had. Yesterday I was stressed about writing a paper for my politics class, yesterday I was crying about my ex boyfriend. Yesterday, yesterday, yesterday... I do not understand this death. I have experienced death before, many times. I watched my grandfather struggle for months against cancer, stood beside my grandmother as her love drew his last breath. Stared at his body, alive one second...

 (1 John 4:4)  Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for  he who is in you is greater than  he who is in the world ." It is so easy to stretch ourselves beyond our limits.  It's easy to give power to people who truly hold none:t o give weight to meaningless words, t o become overwhelmed by the insignificant, or perhaps even the significant-the things that really do matter.  H ere’s the thing-God handles these things. The things that matter, the ones that really may not. He holds all of these things in His hands. He sees me right now and he sees me in nine months.  He holds the power in my life.  He has the last say.  Not me.  Not finances.  Not my parents.  He does.  I must only give credit to the own who has the power in my life.  It’s Him. He has the last say in every single day of my life.  He is fighting the battles that I am emotionally, physically, an...

The other day I saw a text I had sent a couple months ago, that read "It's crazy how often our lives are not about us."  I read that over again, and I laughed.  And then I cried.    Galatians 6:1-2 reads, " Brothers,   if anyone is caught in any transgression,  you who are spiritual should restore him in  a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and  so fulfill  the law of Christ." Christianity is often preached as an intensely personal faith, which it is! The God of the Universe knows the exact composition of dark matter just as well as he knows the emotional composition of my soul.  But in embracing this idea of an intensely personal Savior, we have somehow also embraced the idea of an intensely personal walk with our Savior; as though the steps of our journey are for us and us alone. This is incorrect. The steps of our journey are closely intertwined with the s...

"His love surpasses all understanding..."  sometimes this does not mean sitting in a warm glow of ethereal awe,  with golden light shooting from our fingertips because of JUST HOW LOVED by God we feel in this moment.  His love surpassing all understanding can sometimes mean staring at the shambles of your life, clutching your broken heart in one hand and your ruined plans in the other.  And in that moment you will honestly and rightly wonder, "how is this love?" Sometimes God's love surpassing all understanding will mean we will not feel love with the senses with which we are accustomed.  God's love surpassing all understanding can mean looking at a situation where you, with your limited view of the horizon ahead, cannot logically perceive this love.  Instead you must simply know that there is an agape love working within it all.  That even THIS is love.  God's love surpasses our emotions and our understanding. It exists outside ...